Being Taken ‘Into the Movies’ – Disneyland Paris Update 3.

Today I started my research at the Walt Disney Studios. This theme park, which opened in 2002, pays tribute to Hollywood and movies of Walt Disney, in the vein of Universal Studios or the similar Disney's Hollywood Studios park in Florida and the backlot area of Disney California Adventure.

The entrance plaza is designed to resemble the front gate at a movie studio backlot, and the rest of the park looks like such a lot, with large open spaces and massive buildings labeled ‘Stage 3’ or 'Main Stage.’ Park services and maintenance even ride around in those little golf carts with the tassel rooflines.

The park, especially when compared with Disneyland next door, is a travesty. Really just a horribly disappointing experience. I think I was there for about an hour and a half before I decided that my time was better spent next door.

The only worthwhile experience was the Twilight Zone Terror of Terror, and that's lifted directly from the stateside parks (the French version is an exact clone of the one at California Adventure). It’s not just that Disney spent too little on design and development (though they most certainly did; probably the suits are cautious after the resort’s harsh first few years), the problem also is that certain thematic design decisions just don’t work. As is the case with California Adventure, it seems many creatives at the company need to relearn the techniques that made Disney theme parks wildly popular in the first place.

Overall, the park lacks feeling. It comes across as shallow, boxy and cheap. Something i’ve come to expect from Universal or Six Flags, but not Disney. I think this problem stems from Disney’s decision to not embrace pure simulation. If the park is supposed to resemble a Hollywood backlot, then the appropriate solution is not to just suggest it, but to do it, all the way. Main Street U.S.A. or Frontierland work because they embrace the thematic extreme of pure simulation. This has its own drawbacks, and precious care must be taken to preserve the representation from being shattered by the outside world, but overall it’s a much stronger experience. Walt Disney Studios tries to walk the line between suggesting and simulating. Is it a joke? Is it for real? The impression is one of confusion. However, there are some interesting things going on, and although as a visitor I’m not particularly moved by them, I think I can read the design intent.

The entry building, after you cross the studio courtyard, is a massive studio warehouse. You enter through the doors onto a ‘HOT SET’—the classic lighting rigs and unpainted plywood walls with 2x4 framing are instantly recognizable.

Inside this stage building is a mock set of Hollywood and general Californian / American iconography.

There is a Brown Derby, a tropical place called ‘Liki Tiki,’ a classic retro gas station, the 'Hollywood and Vine’ department store etc.

Now this is where it get weird—the explicit metaphor of a set is carried throughout, so all these stage fronts are intentionally facades, bare wood backs and all. No matter which doorway you walk through, however, they all lead to one large area ‘backstage.’ On the left is one long retail space, and on the right is a fast food court.

I’m not sure how to feel about this. I get what they’re trying to do. This building is supposed to be a gateway that is taking you, literally and figuratively, ‘into the movies.’ So I can understand why the false fronts are false—to be consistent with the pure simulation of the stage set buildings (which is done rather well).

The problem is, the designers are explicitly telling their audience that this is all fake. This admission of illusion makes it very difficult to suspend disbelief, and take the whole thing seriously. And by that I mean, to take theming seriously you have to not look at it seriously.

Any crack in the façade is detrimental, and by showing the audience that it’s indeed all ‘just a show,’ a thematic environment can’t function the way it’s designed to.

It would have been better if these stage sets were designed to accompany the environments, as background elements. But walking through and inhabiting them fundamentally separates the audience from the simulation. And for thematic design, that’s the death knell.

The Power of Color and Backstory – Disneyland Paris Update 2.

Today I went on a two-hour guided walking tour of Disneyland Paris. Normally this is a group thing, but I was the only one who signed up for the English tour that day.

My guide, Gabor, was a Hungarian who has been living in France and working at the resort for four years. Between his English and my French (his English was definitely better) we had some interesting talks. Things began rather formally, but after I explained my project and my level of historical knowledge about the parks, we shifted off-script. There were quite a few things Gabor told me that I didn’t know.

First of all, the general color palette of the park, which is very pastel with many reds and pinks. Why, he asked? Well, this region of France (slightly north and to the east of Paris) is either rainy or overcast grey 90% of the year.

The colors were intentionally designed to amplify whatever sunlight comes through, and provide a joyful palette to contrast with the mute surroundings. This is an excellent example of color setting mood in thematic design.

Color is the most emotive component of any visual communications medium, yet for theming it’s especially vital. Thematic environments need to be drastically mood-altering in order to work properly, and color is strongly tied to mood.

As opposed to Disneyland Paris, in Florida or California (where the sun beats down almost any time of the year), stronger colors in any design have to be intentionally desaturated, lest they get amplified out of proportion.

Gabor and I also discussed the backstory for Frontierland, which is quite extensive. What’s most interesting is that this story, save for a few allusions in Phantom Manor (their equivalent of The Haunted Mansion attraction), is never explicitly told to guests.

There is no, what I call, “hard narrative.” Some thematic environments do explain story elements literally, via placards or video and multimedia presentations. But most rely on what I call “soft narrative”—a sort of nonlinear, atmospheric approach to storytelling.

Despite the implicit nature of all the details, the design is somehow more cohesive and realistic as a result.

Disneyland Paris’ Frontierland is mostly comprised of ghost town called “Thunder Mesa.” This can be inferred from various signage around the area.

There is also a gold mine in the town, as evidenced by the “Lucky Nugget Saloon” and the “Big Thunder Mountain Mine Train.”

Gabor filled me in on the entire story (which is too long to recount here) and he also pointed out to me the various clues—which would totally escape the average guest—embedded in the theming that plays out this story.

Now why, if the story behind these details is unknown to the visitor, do the details somehow make for a richer experience? I didn’t have an answer for Gabor, but I’ve given it some thought since. Every environment with a history of human presence has a human back story—a history.

For example, I might be on a road trip somewhere in the Western United States, and I might drive into a small town to get a meal and a bed for the night. This town has a history—of boom and bust, of waves of settlers, of phases of development.

And that history, detailed though it may be, is only apparent to me indirectly, through obscure visual clues. Layering. Weathering. Signage.

I think because we are used to seeing the evidence of human history on space, we come to regard these small details at completely normal, so much so that we only notice when they are absent. Everyone loves that ‘new car smell’ but it just doesn’t wash for an environment. It feels false. These details, even if we know nothing of the tales behind them, ring true.

In adding so many details that comprise a back story the visitors probably will never know (like here, who is Rose?), the Disney designers are very compellingly approximating what real human history looks and feels like. Hence Frontierland feels more ‘real’ by virtue of its ‘real’ roots.

Frontierland and the Role of Scope – Disneyland Paris Update 1.

After taking a shuttle motor coach direct from CDG airport, I checked into the Hotel Santa Fe. There are several hotels on property or near the Disneyland Paris Resort.

The Hotel New York reflects a Manhattan theme, although more modern and abstract than Las Vegas’ New York, New York simulacrum.

The Sequoia Lodge suggests Frank Lloyd Wright crossed with the famed National Parks lodges built by FDR’s Public Works Administration.

The Newport Bay Club is pure, concentrated New England old money.

The Hotel Cheyenne is a Ghost Town replica in the vein of Tombstone, Arizona—albeit far more kitschy and Hollywoodized.

Lastly my residence—the Hotel Santa Fe—is a sort of a postmodern remix of Southwestern style, with a good dose of motel-chic thrown in. What I’ve found interesting is that the amount and extent of the theming is directly tied to the accommodation’s sticker price. The more upscale the hotel, the more subtle (and modern/abstract) the design approach. I can only afford to stay in ‘kitcheville,’ where the Hotels Cheyenne and Santa Fe sit across from one another, separated by the ‘Rio Grande’ river.

My first impression upon entering the Disneyland park, despite my extreme fatigue and jetlag, was awe. The level of detail and craftsmanship is unparalleled, even for Disney. It’s a well-known fact that the Disneyland Paris Resort failed to post profits and struggled its first few years—what’s rarely mentioned is that this was due less to lack of demand (families from all over Europe adore the place) and more a result of the outrageous sums Disney Imagineering spent concepting, designing, and constructing it.

The park is massive compared to what we have stateside, even larger than the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World (which is itself significantly larger than the original Disneyland in Anaheim).

This can be seen a couple of ways. On the one hand, the sense of intimacy that makes Disneyland a special place for so many is lost somewhat. This is a complaint often leveled at Orlando’s Magic Kingdom—the castle is so tall, Main Street is so large. Yet viewed another way, here in Paris the use of scope and land area serves to strengthen specific themes.

Frontierland is by far the largest area of the park, and with good reason—the French (and the rest of Europe, for that matter) might have quibbles with us in recent times, but they absolutely love our American western heritage.

The closing of the frontier, cowboys and Indians, gold rushes and ghost towns—all these are appreciated largely due to the influence of cinema. The shoot-em-up films of Clint Eastwood and John Wayne, the epics of John Ford, the spaghetti tradition of Serge Leone—all are as popular as ever.

In making Frontierland this large, Disney acknowledges the theme’s popularity, yet the size serves the theme itself—perfectly. The original Frontierland in Anaheim is intimate, to be sure, but overly so. What made the original West so compelling was its vastness. The idea of a wilderness ‘untamed and untapped’ (except for a ‘few’ pesky Indians, of course), the challenge of settling it, the pleasure in moving about it, the glory of so much space between fellow humans.

In analyzing thematic design, I’ve often looked at the use of scale; forced perspective and other tricks of the film trade heavily influence how these spaces are built. Yet scope is just as important as scale, and in giving Frontierland room to breathe, it becomes many powers more real. The endless trails, dead spaces, and the pacing with which sites and landmarks are spaced give a true taste of the openness of the American West.

On My Way to Disneyland Paris.

Despite numerous travel delays (I was bumped by my airline to another carrier) and technical difficulties that have left me stranded at Chicago's O'Hare airport for the night, I am on my way to Disneyland Paris for a week-long research trip. Five days of photography, sketches, notes, observations and conversations. Just trying to immerse myself as much as possible. Because of the perceived 'higher standards' of a European audience, Disneyland Paris was designed completely from scratch. The familiar hub-and-spoke 'Magic Kingdom' model remains, as do most of the signature attractions in one form or another. Yet unlike Tokyo Disneyland (a near perfect combination of the original Disneyland and Orlando's Magic Kingdom) or Hong Kong Disneyland (which replicates Anaheim's original Main Street and castle with exacting detail), the French demanded a high degree of originality in their version. Accordingly, nearly every design element is cut from whole cloth, despite being influenced by past iterations. Familiar icons such as the central castle, Main Street, and entire lands (Tomorrowland is a bold, steampunk-esque Victorian 'Discoveryland') are markedly different and in some cases unrecognizable.

I look forward to soaking all this in over the next several days. Hopefully (and public wi-fi willing) I will have nightly comments and photos up. If i ever leave Chicago, that is.

Queue Up.

A good friend sent me an article from the venerable Mouse Planet the other day about how the Disney Parks handle the queues for various attractions. The author lists a variety of techniques that Disney employs at its parks to alleviate not only actual wait times for attractions, but the perception of waiting. He points to a few basic principles about waiting in line, chief of which is “unoccupied time feels longer than occupied time.” The idea is that by designing the cue area to be an integral part of an attraction’s storyline, patrons feel like they’re “part of the attraction rather than waiting for the attraction.”

One might think that Disney has always done this, but in fact the first attraction to have an integrated, themed queue area was Big Thunder Mountain, which opened at Anaheim's Disneyland in 1979. Since then, all major Disney attractions feature a storyline tightly woven throughout the queue, unifying the attraction with the accompanying wait into a seamless—and pleasant—experience. An excellent example of this unified queue design is Disneyland's Indiana Jones Adventure. Themed after George Lucas and Steven Speilberg's popular film character, this wild exploration of an ancient indian temple begins not as riders board, but at the moment they line up well outside the structure. The story of how Indiana Jones' expedition came to find the temple and the role guests play in "finding Indy" is told entirely through the line, so that once the actually physical ride gets underway, guests already have been briefed on an extensive backstory. The narrative is sometimes overt, yet sometimes very, very subtle; cryptic messages are carved along the way in a custom alphabet, and guests were given a 'decoder' card to read them when the attraction first opened.

If the Indiana Jones adventure cue represents the evolution of this type of thematic design, then Expedition Everest, at Disney's Animal Kingdom (Walt Disney World, Orlando, Florida) may well be the state of the art. When I visited and first rode this thrilling, themed outdoor roller coaster in October of last year, I was astounded. Of course, lines are always longer at the latest and greatest attractions, and Expedition Everest is barely a couple of years old. Disney knows this, so they planned an extensive and lengthy queue area.

The backstory of Expedition Everest is that a old railroad line has been converted into a tour company to take explorers into the mountains of the himalayas. The recent disappearances of visitors suggests that the yeti (“abominable snowman”) may be responsible. This entire narrative is conveyed through the designed spaces that the queue weaves through—first Nepalese temples, then the tour company storerooms and finally a yeti museum. The resulting effect is spectacular. Once I boarded the train, I felt a number of things just from having gone through the queue. Firstly, the wait didn’t seem as long as I thought it was going to be. Secondly, I was completely immersed in the setting of the attraction—I was in Nepal. The heat and humidity of central Florida was but a distant memory. Thirdly, I also knew, with fair certainty, why I was in Nepal, and what was in store for me. Lastly, knowing all this, I was greatly anticipating my encounter with the yeti.

Expedition Everest clearly demonstrates that thematic design as it applies to amusement park queues is about four key things:

  • Occupying and entertaining (thus lessening the perceived wait time)
  • Acting as a transition zone that helps to immerse guests and suspend their disbeliefs
  • Establishing a back story for the attraction
  • Building anticipation and/or suspense